Monday, July 27, 2009

Police will be allowed to order blood drawn from a person suspected of driving while intoxicated without judicial review under certain circumstances, including instances in which the suspect is a repeat offender, a passenger died or in which a child under 15 was a passenger in the vehicle.

...isn't this sort of thing blatantly unconstitutional? See the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I am not usually sympathetic to what a defense attorney has to say, but Doug Murphy is exactly right when he says that if you put too much power in one agency it will run amok. (see: The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms)And of course the prosecutor would cite public safety as the overriding concern here. One wonders what other parts of the Bill of Rights he would suspend in the name of that. The Second Amendment immediately comes to mind, especially considering that certain other cities have done just that. And then I'm sure the Fifth Amendment has caused him all sorts of trouble too.Then there's the law prof's mention that the Supreme Court has ruled in the past that this sort of thing is hunky-dory. Tell me again, the value of following the stare decisis doctrine...?

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Unorganized Militia Propaganda Corps

About Me

I am a very opinionated guy, Texan and quite proud of it. I lean toward the right politically but have a few libertarian tendencies that my conservative brothers and sisters might not agree with. I like guns, old country music and a lot of other things.

Essential Reading

False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils, except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Can it be supposed that those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity, the most important of the code, will respect the less important and arbitrary ones, which can be violated with ease and impunity, and which, if strictly obeyed, would put an end to personal liberty -- so dear to men, so dear to the enlightened legislator -- and subject innocent persons to all the vexations that the guilty alone ought to suffer? Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.-- Cesare Beccaria, in On Crimes And Punishments, later quoted by Thomas Jefferson

Echo

The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.-- Alexander Hamilton